Birthday Bonanza!

Hope you all had a wonderful New Years. The past couple weeks have been crazy. Have you ever felt like you worked all day, but had nothing to show for it. I have been running around dealing with disasters. I feel like every day I end up right back where I started never getting anything checked off my list. Finally today I think I made progress. Including, but not limited to, having my blog hosting fixed. I don’t know if you’ve been having any problems loading the sight, but that should be better now.

Husband’s birthday was this week though, so I spent that day cooking his favorite dinner and baking him a carrot cake. It was fun. The carrot cake recipe I used was from modified from AllRecipes. And my decorating idea from Chocolate Carrots.

DIRECTIONS:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease and flour a three 8 inch round pans. (I actually did 6 inch pans and a couple cupcakes.)
2. In a large bowl, beat together eggs, apple sauce, butter, white sugar and 2 teaspoons vanilla. In a separate bowl combine flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt and cinnamon. Add dry ingredient to your egg mixture. Stir in carrots. Fold in pecans. Pour into prepared pans.
3. Bake in the preheated oven for 40 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean. Let cool in pan for 10 minutes, then turn out onto a wire rack and cool completely.
4. To Make Frosting: Constantly whisking, heat flour, milk, and cinnamon over low/medium heat until it forms a thick batter (think brownie batter consistency). Remove from heat, add vanilla. Allow mixture to cool completely. Using a stand mixer (or handheld and a large bowl) cream together butter, cream cheese, and white sugar until light, fluffy, and no more graininess. Add flour mixture and continue to beat on medium/high speed until its fluffy with stiff peaks.

Note 1: Instead of apple sauce and butter you may use 1 1/4 cups oil. The original recipe called for vegetable, and I didn’t have any. I might also try coconut oil.

Note 2: For this icing I subbed 1/2 cream cheese in for butter. But that causes the icing to not hold its shape as well, especially in higher temperatures. It still looks beautiful, but it’s probably not going to work for really fancy decorating.

Hi, I’m Kristin!

I am 28 years old. I have a degree in Chemical Engineering, but I am currently attending school for a degree in Nutrition and working as nanny. I started blogging a couple years ago to showcase my handmade jewelry and baking projects. Since then I have gotten married, moved with my husband and two puppies from New Jersey to North Carolina, and bought a townhouse. Now I'll take on any project even if its not jewelry or baking.
So my blog has turned into more of lifestyle blog with a little bit of everything. I love it because I can keep all of my projects organized in one place and its a good way to keep my family in Jersey updated on what I've been up to. Hopefully you find something you like too!